Playing Every Game in the Bundle for Racial Justice and Equality
PEGBRJE: ‘VoltAge: Genesis’ and ‘Perpetuum Mobile’
Sorry I’m late, page 37 started massive.
VoltAge:Genesis is a top-down JRPG by Golden Fish Entertainment, an indie studio based out of the United States. Players will follow a duo in the ‘Volt Age’, years after a nuclear war ravaged the land, turning it in to the Deadlands. These two wish to make a stake out in the land with the newly received ‘Reclamation Act’, and set forth to create a town out of a wasteland. From there, anything is possible.
Players will pilot Nolan and Bridget, two steadfast adventurers, in this massive continental JRPG. Players familiar with the formula will immediately catch on, with its large scaling, open world sectioned in to cities and regions to enter and explore, and dozens of characters to talk with. Exploring each location can reveal secrets and loot, both useful for uncovering the plot that revolves around the continent. Items found can be sold for volts, equipped as weapons or traded to others for quest completion.
The main feature is that the world is open to explore at the leisure of the player. There may be a subtle hint about where the ‘main’ plot is going, but players can easily ignore it and go their own way.
Combat encounters are expected in JRPGs, bringing the players in to a battle screen where they will engage in turn-based combat. Each character that is recruited is available to join in the fight, with the team capping out at four. These characters will all have special abilities gained through levelling up, from healing to de-buffs to more damage. The ‘magic’ of this world is called kinesis. It’s used by specific individuals with dozens of different types and elements to work with. This is different than the abilities many characters use, and is locked to these specific characters. Knowing which ones work with is crucial to completion.
What VoltAge:Genesis brings to the table is its sheer scale thanks to its open endedness. Dozens of quests can be discovered throughout the lands, and their order of completion is based on how the player explores. Some may wish to find the ‘main’ path as fast as possible. Others will simply venture off their own way and find new friends and quests. Every new adventure brings in new friends, growing the town and its facilities to create a bustling town that can be returned to at any time.
If you love traditional JRPGs that give you space to explore than this will be perfect for you to dive in to.
Perpetuum Mobile is a retro arcade flier-shooter created by Petrus-Games, a solo game dev based out of Belgium. Players will return to vector-based shapes as they fire through a linear world in the hopes of seeing how big their score can be and how far they can go.
The player’s white vector ship will fly ever forward as it infinitely shoots to destroy everything. All obstacles are colour-coded to give players the ability to figure out what they are as they fly past. Purple cubes are destructible and give points, while orange pillars are indestructible and do not (unfortunately). Sky blue triangles are arguably the most important items to shoot, for they increase the speed of the ship by 250 for each destroyed. While this makes the colours fly by faster and makes the game more dangerous, it also increases the amount of points gained. There is an argument to be made that it can assist in reaching farther as well, but that goes hand in hand with the speed after all.
It’s the simplicity that allows for Perpetuum Mobile to be so successful. It can be picked up and played almost immediately, with only a joystick required. The music is a bop, adding to the fun as you zip through wireframes of objects and try not to crash horribly. It’s also available in VR. I can’t tell you how well it plays in VR, but I can only assume that it will be full of neon and speed.
If you love titles that bring back the older days of simplicity and going way too fast for your own good, then this is your jam.
